A strategy for reconstructing West St. Paul’s busy commercial corridor is in place.

After weighing options that outlined where construction could start on South Robert Street and how to divert traffic, the West St. Paul City Council decided to divide the major road work into three areas and spread it over three years.

The other alternative was splitting the work into two larger areas to be completed in two years, a time period that city officials hoped could happen but ultimately agreed would not be manageable.

“Once we got into the details on how to build this massive project, it was clear we couldn’t do it in two years,” said Dave Hutton, a senior associate with SRF Consulting Group, which is designing the project for the city.

Under the timetable recently approved for the $20 million project, major construction of the 2.5-mile stretch of road will begin next spring at the northern end, where there is less traffic. Work will creep south, wrapping up in 2016 at Mendota Road.

Jump-started by a $7 million federal grant, planning began three years ago to fix the look, functionality and safety of the five-lane strip between Mendota Road and Annapolis Street.

Work will include building raised and landscaped center medians; adding two lanes north of Butler Street by removing parking; and replacing the road’s aging pavement, storm sewer network, traffic-control signals and streetlights.

Besides the starting point, city officials were faced with what to do with traffic along the north-south state road, which carries up to 26,000 vehicles a day through its busiest spots.

“One of the biggest issues with staging this project is the amount of traffic,” Hutton said.

When a stretch of road is under construction, crews will work on two lanes while the remaining two will remain open for traffic.

The council agreed with a recommendation from SRF Consulting and city staff to send traffic in one direction, instead of two, in the area under construction, noting how it should provide better access to local businesses.

A downside with the one-way tactic is that more motorists will be diverted to alternative routes, such as Oakdale Avenue to the east of Robert Street, Hutton said.

However, weighing heavily in the council’s decision was the desire to allow motorists to turn left onto driveways and cross streets and to allow delivery trucks to make right-hand turns. Because of heavy backups, both scenarios would have been prohibited if traffic traveled two ways.

The one-way option also enables better responses for emergency service vehicles and breakdowns, Hutton said.

Mayor John Zanmiller said the road’s tight confines and large number of right-of-ways limit how traffic can flow during construction.

“I wish I could wave a magic wand and say, ‘We’re just going to shift traffic over,’ ” he said. “But the reality of the situation is we have this very narrow area, and it has to be worked with.”

Dave Motz, president of the Robert Street Business Association, called the one-way route “the best of two evils.” From the get-go, the group has been vocally opposed to center medians because they will allow only right-hand turns along most of the road.

“From what I read into it, if there were two directions going during construction, they would eliminate all left turns, which is really bad, and which is what the median will do anyway when the work is done,” Motz said.

He said the business group, which has 42 members, plans to approach the city and ask if the direction of traffic could be switched during rush hours.

“In the morning hours it should go north, and in the evening it should go south,” he said.

A DIFFICULT PROJECT

Under the project’s timetable, 2014 will include the reconstruction of the half-mile stretch of Robert Street between Butler Avenue and Annapolis Street as well as improvements to Oakdale Avenue and other temporary routes.

The work could coincide with Dakota County’s plan to add a roundabout at Oakdale and Wentworth avenues, Hutton said. Because traffic will be routed to Oakdale Avenue, the county is trying to move the project up to 2014, he said.

In 2015, crews will work on Robert Street from Annapolis to Wentworth Avenue. Wentworth Avenue to Mendota Road will be done in 2016, while 2017 will be set aside for finishing landscaping and other “punch-list items.”

Hutton described the project as “cumbersome,” weighed down and delayed, in part because of the many funding sources and approvals that are needed. He noted that the scope and cost of the project have increased dramatically since planning began in November 2011.

A year ago, city officials learned the project’s cost would nearly double from the original $10.4 million estimate. They blamed it on unanticipated expenses and on underestimates by a consulting firm that worked with the city to prepare the grant application.

Meanwhile, Zanmiller said, it is important to realize the project “isn’t punching a road out into a cornfield.”

“It will be difficult,” he said. “There will be problems, but we are going to do everything possible to ensure that business has its access, including doing special signage to direct people to businesses, and to work as quickly as possible.”

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